Understanding Her Mind
by The Scribe of Human Condition
Summary: Aubry Selene has been through hell. Her memories are foggy at best, and when she is finally found and put in Workley's Home for Underprivileged Teenagers she has to learn 17 years of social rules and queues and taboos while battling her inner demons. When you mix a mentally unstable 17-year-old with a community of cynical teenage orphans, what could possibly go wrong?


"It was a Pleasure to Burn."

When she read the first line, she smiled bitterly. Of course it was. She of all people knew that.

It had been the first book she ever read. She knew _how_ to read, obviously, but she had never read an actual _book_ before. It was pure irony that those words were the ones that carved a tattoo under her skin; they branded her, defined her.

That night- the first night- she lay awake, her cheeks stinging with tears. She heard the echoing words from the memories that drowned the sound of blood in her ears. Every word he had ever spoken.

So, in the black of the night, she got up. Her moves were shaky and mechanical. She remembered a time she did it so effortlessly, in the house where she knew every spot that creaked. Her black hair spun in messy curls around her face, but she paid them no heed while she slipped her hand into her pocket.

Her salvation.

She held it tight, when she got to the window- she couldn't find a bathroom- she held it out, staring at it. The moons silvery beams reflected off of it, the clean, soft edges calling her to let it save her.

Her eyes glowed white in the shadows, their natural green- which had lost its shine long ago- hidden by the dim glow of metal as she gazed down at the beautiful instrument. If the Universe had a color, she decided, I was the exact shade of metallic that shone off her only remaining possession.

Never releasing it from her gaze, she flicked the long edge of it, snapping it away from the body. Even extended it was smaller than her hand, and she ran a finger along the blade. She shivered, her silent breaths growing slower.

She moved her knife so it was aligned with the inside of her wrist, before pressing down and dragging.

Her breath hitched. The feeling didn't hurt. That's what people thought. For a minute it just seems as if you had a tight, thin hair tie pressed against your wrist. The indented skin reacts to the knife, but it's not deep enough to break the layers of skin immediately. Then, it bleeds like a brush burn, little speckles, just enough to scab. _Then_ it starts to sting; throb like the veins that run in your neck. She needed all of it. She watched in fascination every time.

She repeated the process, again and again. _She_ was in control. For a little while the voices went away. She didn't know how long she was by the window.

Her breath sped up as she realized she would have to hide them. At the house he never looked at her. He was there and then he was gone, like a phantom.

When he was there, his brain was empty. He beat her senselessly, saying the same thing over and over. Every time a repeat of the last. Living in a terrible echo.

When he wasn't there she was alone. She remembered being alone so long, sometimes so long that she forgot the echoes and prayed for his return. Then he would come back and she would remember all over again and realize that God loved her, but also that God loved her pain.

So she did God's will.

But here, in the new place with other people, they would see. They would pay attention.

She went back to the mattress and laid down. Turning sideways, she tucked the folded, beautiful switchblade into the pillow.

She didn't care, she decided. Nobody cared about her, so why should she care about them.

She drifted to sleep, her chest devoid of feeling. As if she had carved them out with her knife.

Her only thought the next morning was she wished she could do the same to her brain.

 **Heyo! So, just like my other story, HR:AW, I'm testing this. Although this was more of a plot bunny because I randomly wrote this at 10 at night when I was feeling particularly depressed.**

 **Getting past my weird feelings of angst (psh, what am I talking about? I'm a teenage girl, when am I _not_ angsty?) please tell me what you think!**

 **I was going to make it a depressing one shot, but I feel like I could make a deeper meaning out of it.**

 **Guys, please understand this is totally unusual for me! I am, for the most part, a completely sarcastic, hopefully amusing, grinning little midget of a girl.**

 **I did cut once, but I was only like two cuts and I've never done it since. so if you're creeped out because of my in depth description of cutting don't fret. It was the point anyway.**

 **That was my experience, and I feel people have this idea of what cutting is, and most of the time it's wrong. I know I was.**

 **Getting past that, just please tell me whether its worth continuing and if you like it!**

 **Don't hesitate to Review or PM me with questions or responses,**

 **The Almighty Scribe of Human Condition (Btw, what do you think of my username? I WANT TO KNOW!)**


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